


Act Like You Belong

by transmattsc



Category: Eddsworld - All Media Types
Genre: Gen, Sanitize your data input and check the database, The Red Army is Incompetent™, Tord fires the people that let him be hired in the first place, Tord is trans but it does not have any relevance to the story, Tord succeeds the old Red Leader
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-25
Updated: 2019-11-25
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:07:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21564265
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transmattsc/pseuds/transmattsc
Summary: Tord never actually officially joined the Red Army... it's kind of a long story as to how he became Red Leader.
Kudos: 22





	Act Like You Belong

Tord was never one for crowds. Unfortunately, sometimes he had to blend into them and hope he was going in the right directions. Without his friends around to drag him places, he often found himself getting lost on the streets of his hometown. Currently, he had become trapped in a crowd of people who looked like they had come right from the gym- he didn't dare try to leave the crowd, it would be too much of a hassle to remove himself. He would wait until the crowd dissipated. The young man carried himself slightly higher than usual, to try to not seem out of place among the gaggle of people in matching outfits. 

Then, he realized that he was wearing clothes that were identical to the rest of the crowd's. He wondered if this was a jogging club of some sort. Tord sighed, realizing that he would have to explain himself to at least thirty different people if he tried to leave the crowd before it dissipated on its own. So, he followed.

The others began to look at him curiously. Was he a new general? His hair looked dangerously similar to their Army's symbol. Perhaps he was watching them. Their backs straightened, their shoulders became more squared, and they made sure to march more neatly. 

Tord imitated them in their endeavor, blissfully unaware that they thought he was part of a secret communist organization. Even more unaware was he that they didn't only think that, but they also thought that he was high up in the ranks of said organization. He just happened to be existing during the wrong time of year, in the wrong part of Norway, his situation further exacerbated by his poor fashion choices. The man looked around at his temporary comrades, noticing similar bandages on their arms to those on his. The bandages there only had been put on to hide an embarrassing dragon tattoo that he had gotten while drunk on his eighteenth birthday- he didn't remember half of that night, but he did know that he could at least partially blame his old buddy Jehovah's Witness for it.

After many moments of marching in a neat row with the various well-kept persons surrounding him, Tord found himself in front of a menacingly large building, dark and unfamiliar. Yep, he was definitely lost this time. It would be Hell to get back home, and he definitely wouldn't make it there before dark. His cheeks began to burn with slight shame as he found himself blindly following the crowd inside, into what appeared to be a locker room. What was he thinking? He needed to leave before he got himself into trouble. Tord turned towards the door.

But, yet, he and those around him felt that he belonged in the bustling locker room. The people around him seemed to have some sort of great respect for him, too. A short man with a black baseball cap bumped into him mistakenly, and immediately saluted and uttered a "Sorry, sir," in a perfect Boston accent. He did not seem to be bluffing, or faking the accent, for that matter. Why was this man in Norway? Tord supposed it wasn't really something for him to know.

Tord nodded in understanding. "It's okay." He decided not to comment on how amusing he found the man's accent when mixed with the language that they conversed in. Nearly paralyzed with fear that his supervisors would find out what he did, the shorter man ran off, dodging people left and right to return to his quarters. The Norski decided he'd stay for a while and try to casually explain his way out if he was caught. It wouldn't be that big of a deal! He was armed, anyway, so if a fight broke out, no problem, right?

Tord spotted an abandoned uniform- just his size, too!- and quickly slipped it on. It appeared to be freshly cleaned, and with no name tag. He could brush it off as having lost it in the kerfuffle of the locker room. This might just be a fun way for Tord to spend his afternoon, infiltrating a weird secret base of an organization that probably will have a bounty on his head after he leaves. Oh, well. He was missing England already, he could always just go back and hide from them there.

The Norski stood up as straight as he could, and marched quietly out of the locker room, and down a hallway, seeing the soldiers in it immediately salute him. He approached one of them casually, his pacing matching those of army generals he had seen in his cheesy movies. “Soldier.”

“Yes, Sir?” The soldier was frozen to the spot. Only a man with such a high rank would show such dedication to the Red Army so casually. The man in front of him had such perfectly gelled up horns in his hair, and a tidy uniform that even Red Leader would envy. He was clean shaven, too- although he didn’t know that Tord had other reasons for that.

“At ease. Could you please remind me of where the human resources office is?”

“In the West Wing’s main hallway, Sir.”

“Thank you.” Tord gave a curt nod to the man and made his way westward, enjoying the quiet scenery of the base. He could get used to it.

And used to it was what he got. He had his nametag replaced at Human Resources, and it was even easier than he thought it would be. Everyone in this army seemed to be a fool.

He got his own desk and quarters, bluffing got him practically everywhere as he made himself at home in this unusual place over the course of eight long years. Tord paid off the rest of his lease on his apartment, quit his job, and began working for the slightly moronic yet well-paying communist organization. Hell, he was even allowed to smoke on the job, it was heaven for him there. All he had to do was paperwork that didn’t even take him that long, and he had loads of free time because other soldiers were too slow and thus earned the entire rank a time extension. He’d shoot the shit with other generals. He even climbed the ranks to become dangerously close to Red Leader himself.

Then Red Leader decided to retire, and, much to his surprise, he was nominated by Red Leader to succeed him. No one had bothered to check and make sure that Tord was a real soldier, no one had bothered to check the records. He got a new office, a new uniform, had his nametag changed to “Red Leader”, and inherited a really cool helmet. He now had full control over the army, and he knew what his first order of business would be.

* * *

"And that, gentlefolk, is why all of you are being demoted to janitorial status. You aren't even competent as security officers, and you certainly won't do well as soldiers if you're this stupid." Red Leader put out his cigar on the conference table's ashtray as he wrapped up his story. "Why in the devil's name did I even get promoted to this position in the first place? Because all of you are terrible at your job, and didn't even check if I was a real soldier or not in the eight fucking years I've been here. You are all idiots, get out of my sight before one of you gets the job of being my personal ashtray." He sighed as his new janitorial staff left the room. “Stephen, please go and notify the new guys that I’m ready to train them. I’m going to have to make a quick announcement over the PA about the temporary switch over to paper documentation. It’s a miracle that our digital database still works with how many opportunities there have been for tomfoolery with that thing.”

“Yes, sir.”

**Author's Note:**

> It's a miracle that the Red Army didn't get their database destroyed by an enemy or rookie soldier performing some SQL injection...


End file.
